


Somebody's Daughter

by ashesandhoney



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Angst, F/M, Half-Reveal, Marichat
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-04
Updated: 2016-06-27
Packaged: 2018-05-24 15:47:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 20,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6158639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ashesandhoney/pseuds/ashesandhoney
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ladybug will not be coming. </p><p>Choose someone else. </p><p>My daughter is only fourteen.</p><p>What happens when your parents find out that you're a superhero?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Baking Tins and Building Sites

The battle had come to a close without Ladybug making an appearance. He stood in the middle of a pile of rubble, this Akuma had used an gigantic hammer and had spent the better part of an hour flinging concrete at Chat Noir. He hadn’t exactly enjoyed the experience and now he stood with a dazed construction worker at his feet and the remains of the new office building they had been putting out around them.

He held the Akuma itself in his hands while his miracle stone beeped at him to let him know he was running out of time to come up with a better option than wait for Ladybug. He pinched it by one wing and held it at arms length. It fluttered weakly against his hand. It was just a butterfly but something about it felt wrong. The evil of it was trying and failing to soak into him as it had soaked into its victim.

“Stay still,” he told it.

Across the wreckage, twisted metal and overturned earth, he caught sight of movement and his attention popped up. There was still dust in the air and he could hear the sound of a car horn blaring somewhere nearby. A long uninterrupted drone that he’d ignored until he’d looked in that direction. The person coming towards him was small, moving with purpose, they were walking not swinging but for a second he was still sure it was her.

It wasn’t.

A small, vaguely familiar woman picked her way through the rubble. Chat waved his hand at her, “No, madam, they say the earth moves for pretty ladies but it might actually fall for you,” he grinned as he scampered over a fallen girdle and skirted a hole in the ground. Even with one hand still holding the butterfly, he was far faster than she was. He managed to get to her and stand in her way before she got to the worst of the wreckage.

She was older than he’d thought. Probably in her early forties, and she had to tilt her head all the way back to look at him. Short hair, almond eyes, all rounded edges. Mrs. Cheng. Mrs. Cheng who was the mother of one of his classmates.

“My daughter won’t be needing this anymore,” she said holding out a plastic container with a green snap top lid. There was a single hole punched in the top. Something inside moved. A hamster? Why was this woman bringing him a hamster?

“Excellent, but this isn’t the place to leave it. And I’m not going to eat it if that’s what you were thinking. I only eat gourmet, not free range,” Chat told her.

“You need to choose someone else. She is fourteen, she is still a child. Pick someone else,” Mrs. Cheng said. He was attempting to turn her around and push her back out of the building site without letting the Akuma touch her. She was upset about something though why a fourteen year old with a hamster was so concerning was beyond him. He really just needed her out of the way until Ladybug arrived.

His miracle stone beeped again. He twisted his hand to see only two spots left.

“Please get out of here until Ladybug has had a chance to put it right,” Chat said. If flirting didn’t work and jokes didn’t work. He would try being polite. If that didn’t work, he could always pick her up and carry her back to the street so she didn’t fall in a pit.

“Ladybug will not be coming,” Mrs. Cheng said and then once more, with more strength and command in her voice than he might have expected from someone who had always been smiles and cookies she said, “Pick someone else.”

She pushed the baking container into his free hand and then turned and walked away. He stared after her, baffled and worried. Ladybug will not be coming. How could she know that? Was she an Akuma too? She’d looked so normal.

His miracle stone beeped again and he glared at it as though that could change anything. One more before he lost the transformation entirely. Minutes to figure out what was going on and what to do with the Akuma.

The container still had white powder on the lid and was labeled as baking soda. He held it balanced on one hand and it jerked. The thing inside slammed into the edge and knocked it out of his hand. He yelped and scrambled for it out of instinct but it hit the ground and the lid popped open.

Something small and red flew out. Spiraling up and then coming back to float in front of his face. It was all head. Big eyes, small body, alarm in every feature. Like Plagg. Plagg if he was red and adorable instead of black and infuriating.

Ladybug will not be coming.

Choose someone else.

My daughter is only fourteen.

Chat stared at the Kwami. She unhinged her jaw, opened her mouth grotesquely wide and snatched the Akuma out of his finger tips. She held it with her cheeks puffed out for a moment. Then she tilted her head back and breathed out the light that Ladybug could call down to put it all to rights. As the building site started to reassemble itself around him, Chat heard the last beep.

He changed back. There, in the middle of everything. The building site was empty but he’d never been so careless before. He had never been so dumbfounded before. Not once. Never in his life.

“Miracle stone!” Plagg snapped as soon as they were separate again. He zoomed towards the ground and into the other Kwami’s plastic prison. Adrien dropped down to his knees and picked out a pair of red earrings. They were dusted with the baking soda and stared up at him like little accusing eyes.

“You should never do that alone,” Plagg was saying and Adrien couldn’t figure out what he meant.

“Someone had to,” the other Kwami answered.

“You are not strong enough to do that alone, there is a reason we do not use the powers alone,” Plagg said. The two of them were floating in mid air. Plagg zooming back and forth in jerky little patterns like he did sometimes when he was angry at Adrien.

“We need to go,” Adrien said.

He didn’t pick up the baking soda bin. He hadn’t had enough time to think it through but he was struck by an irrational anger at the bit of plastic. He kicked it and it went skittering across the dirt. He tried to imagine if someone had taken Plagg and his ring and tossed them in an old kitchen bin and sealed it up. He almost went to go and kick it again.

Plagg landed on his shoulder and distracted him from his anger. Plagg was tired but compared to Ladybug’s Kwami, he was a bundle of energy. She drifted down with all the weight and energy of a soap bubble on a gust of air. Adrien caught her in one hand, she curled around the earrings on his palm and fell asleep.

“How dare they?” Adrien asked.

Neither of the little creatures answered him. He tucked Plagg into his pocket and shrugged out of his jacket so he could drape to over his arm and carry Ladybugs Kwami where she was. Plagg, for once did not complain about anything.

Marinette Dupain-Cheng, who sat behind him in homeroom every day, who sometimes stared at him like he had two heads when he tried to say anything to her, who was smart and pretty but awkward and utterly normal, that Marinette, was Ladybug. Her family had found out and done what Hawkmoth had been trying to do for ages.

They had taken her miracle stone from her.

He wasn’t quite sure what he was supposed to do about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A note on Tikki:
> 
> Tikki is a peacemaker. She probably phased out of the box a few times - I'm imagining the Dupain-Chengs having a hell of a time chasing her around the bakery - but doing that wasn't making it better. So she stayed in the baking soda canister until she could determine what was happening and how to go about fixing it. Upon the decision being - after Marinette had been sent out of the room - to give her back to Chat Noir, she just sat in the box and waited because it was the most convenient solution. She wasn't planning on having to incapacitate herself by eating an Akuma (which yes is straight out of Tendencies though I made it a little harder on Tikki than kryallaorchid did in her fic but hat-tip to her for the idea)
> 
> Her plan was just to be calmly delivered to Chat by Mrs. Cheng and then take the earrings and fly home. Problem solved. Until she had to nearly kill herself to stop the Akuma and it threw everything sideways.


	2. Sleeping Kwami and Stolen Purses

Ladybug’s Kwami was still sleeping the next morning. She was curled tight around the earrings and Adrien couldn’t wake her or move her or even get her to loosen her hold. He talked to her, stroked her head, even shook her but she slept on. Plagg watched the production from a perch on top of the computer monitor. 

“She needs to recharge,” Plagg said.

“She hasn’t eaten anything,” Adrien said. 

“Different kind of recharge, and she lost her person, that’s bad,” Plagg said. 

“She hasn’t lost anything. I’m going to see Marinette in an hour. I can give her back,” Adrien said.

“Separation is bad. Using your powers alone is bad, she can draw power back from the stone but it’ll take time,” Plagg pitched this a little louder like an accusation. He narrowed his eyes at the little red ball sleeping in front of the keyboard. She didn’t respond to Plagg anymore than she had responded to Adrien. 

Without a better idea, he made a little nest out of a soft scarf and slipped it, along some fruit and cheese, into a pocket in his backpack so he could carry her with him to school. He would explain it all to Marinette and hand her back and they’d go on as they always had. Everything would be fine once she had her miracle stone back. 

At school though, he found himself at a loss for what to say or how to start the conversation. Marinette was not herself. She came into the room with Alya, like she always did but her face was drawn and her posture was different. Her shoulders tight, her fingers clenched around the strap of her bag, her eyes downcast but sharp to snap up when someone spoke near her. 

Defensive. 

No. 

Angry. 

She was angry. He had seen Ladybug mad but it hadn’t been like this. This was silent and hidden away behind polite manners but everyone could tell there was something wrong. 

“Marinette?” he said as they passed in the halls between classes and she turned back to him, blinking rapidly. She gave him a calmer version of the strange silent treatment he usually got. Usually she stared at him like she was offended that he would talk to her at all. She had to tilt her head back almost as far as her mother had to look him in the eye. The eye contact only lasted a moment before she was looking at her feet again. 

“Are you alright?” he asked. 

“I’m late for English,” she said and then she turned and was gone into the crowd of students. Adrien just stood there, his bag held against his chest so that no one bumped it and hurt the Kwami inside. He had somehow screwed that up and he wasn’t even sure how. 

The day dragged on. 

He failed twice more to say something coherent. She didn't look at him so he could catch her eye. He tried to catch her in the hallway again and got caught by Chloe instead. By the time he'd untangled himself from her, Marinette was gone. 

At lunch he had a completely different idea. It took a full period before he managed to get a chance to do it. Before math class let out, he stole her bag. She sat across the aisle from him but they were near the back. Mylene was up at the board so there was no one behind him to see as he kicked a foot out and caught the strap off the little shoulder bag she usually carried. He shoved it into his own bag and then sat up before anyone noticed. 

In a bathroom stall, he opened up the bag and said a few silent apologies to Marinette for going through her things. He pushed the wallet and notebook out of the way and carefully placed the little bundle of fabric and sleeping Kwami in the space between. He tucked everything in so she was warm and snug and as safe as he could make her. 

“Look at you fussing like she’s a baby. Me, you grab round the head and call names,” Plagg whispered from his pocket. 

“She’s hurt and you’re annoying,” Adrien whispered back. 

Plagg stuck his tongue out and made an impressively loud fart noise. It echoed off the high ceiling of the empty bathroom. Adrien grabbed him round the head and pushed him into his shoulder bag instead. Plagg cackled from between the binders and books. Adrien pulled a notepad out and shut the bag on Plagg who was still making much smaller fart noises and giggling. 

He wrote a note that explained as much as he knew. How her Kwami had gotten hurt, that she needed to recharge, that she was going to be fine. He stared at the piece of paper and the empty space at the bottom. 

A page went out over the speaker system reminding students of some meeting after school. 

Someone came in and had a quick whispered conversation on their cell phone without noticing that the bathroom wasn’t empty. 

Still he couldn’t decide. 

The bell for the end of the period range and he signed the note as Chat Noir instead of himself and then tucked it into the bag. He went back out into the throng of students headed to their last class of the day and pretended he hadn’t just spent an entire period sitting on a toilet unable to sign his name. 

They were back in homeroom and that made it easy. He just turned and slipped the bag back in at Marinette’s feet as the teacher began her lecture. He was jumpy and anxious for the rest of class. He tapped his pen against his desk in little repetitive patterns until Chloe tilted her head to stare at him. He stopped, trapping the pen between his hand and the desk with a little snap. Marinette jumped behind him. He heard it. He'd never noticed how close she was before. She was just sitting there behind him. 

“I thought you lost that at lunch?” Alya said handing the bag back to Marinette as they gathered up their things to go home. 

Marinette frowned at it, “I thought I had. I guess I’d just gotten it tangled in my jacket. It’s been that kind of day.”

“Tomorrow will be brighter,” Alya said with a confident smile. She wrapped an arm around Marinette’s shoulder and pulled her off down the stairs. Adrien’s eyes followed them until they were out of sight. 

“Seriously?” Nino asked. 

“Seriously, what?” Adrien said. 

“Tell me you weren’t just staring at Alya,” Nino said. 

“I wasn’t staring at Alya,” Adrien said. 

“Were you staring at Marinette then? Because you were staring at something,” Nino said.

“I wasn’t staring,” Adrien said which was the wrong answer. It was an answer that sounded far too much like an admission. Nino followed him down the steps of the school asking leading questions that he kept attempting to ignore. His luck held for once. The car was waiting for him. 

“I’m sorry, Nino, I gotta go,” he said and he ducked into the backseat and leaned back against the leather seat. It always smelled the same in here. It didn’t matter which car it was, they all smelled like the same brand of cleaner and leather and money. His driver never talked unless he did first so it was a silent drive home. 

The majority of the staff were fully trained as body guards as well as whatever their official function was. Adrien suspected that picking up the child from school was not what any of them had expected to be doing with their lives when they had gone to body guard school. Some of them hid the resentment better than others and Adrien knew they were well paid for the indignity of playing chauffeur for a teenager. 

At home he ate the food that had been made up for him by someone else his father had hired. It was probably delicious but he couldn’t taste it. His mind was full of other things. Marinette had grown up in a bakery. She probably had homemade treats waiting for her after a day of school. He’d never considered Marinette much. She was one of those kids who had a life he dreamed of. Parents who were there to cheer her on at events, the right to go out without a twenty minute negotiation or an exit via skylight.

She was also Ladybug. 

His Ladybug.

Marinette was Ladybug.

He spread his homework out on his desk and then gave up on it and went to lie on his bed. He could stare at the ceiling until the chauffeur or maybe Nathalie came to collect him and take him to some enriching extracurricular activity. He didn’t know what day of the week it was and couldn’t guess whether it was Chinese or fencing or swim lessons. There was no way he was lucky enough for it to be Thursday and for him to have nothing. 

He glanced at his phone. 

Again. 

And then again. 

And then once more before he realized he was waiting for her to call him and tell him off for having taken her bag. Except she didn’t know it was him. He had signed it as Chat Noir and she still didn’t know who Chat Noir was. She might want to tell Chat off, to roll her eyes and tell him thank you in that quiet voice she only used when she really meant it. She couldn’t do that because he had chickened out and hadn’t told her. 

He flipped over onto his stomach and buried his face in his pillow and groaned. He was an idiot. She was right there and he hadn’t been able to so much as tell her hello. Hadn’t he planned out speeches and conversations for them to have? Imaginary conversations, yes, but even those had been forgotten when he was faced with her looking so upset. 

“Adrien, your Chinese lessons start in twenty minutes, we had best be going,” someone called up the stairs. He attempted to shut out all his thoughts and he grabbed his bag and went to spend another two hours in school.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story doesn't get chapter titles. No... it should or I'll never find scenes when I need to go back and double check details when I'm editing later chapters. Le sigh. 
> 
> How long can I stick to an "Every other day" update schedule? Probably not long but let's try anyways. 
> 
> When I started this one, I hadn't decided what Adrien was going to do with that information until I wrote it. That was when this story came together in my head. Awkward Adrien is my jam. :D


	3. Tears and Terrace Visits

Marinette sat on her bed and held Tikki in her lap and tried not to start crying again.

When her father had succeeded in catching Tikki in an empty container from the kitchen, they had said they would get rid of her. Marinette had been terrified that that meant they were going to hurt her. Drown her in the river or toss her out with the trash. She had spent the day swinging from guilt, because she had been the one who was careless enough to get caught, and grief. Her mind spinning up worse and worse imaginings every time she let it wander.

It was her mother and father, though. Really, she should have known it wouldn’t be anything that awful. Her mother couldn’t hurt a living thing if the living thing was a bear chewing on her leg. She just boxed Tikki up and given her back. That Chat hadn’t been the one to choose her or to bring her the miracle stone didn’t matter. Her mother had safely returned Tikki and told Marinette for her own good. 

The panic hadn’t receded though until she found Tikki curled up with a note and an bit of sliced fruit in her purse. Then it had exploded into tears of relief. She’d curled up around the bag, sat down on the floor of her room and sobbed as quietly as she could. She read the note over and over and planned out ways to kill Chat Noir for stealing her bag and not even saying hello. 

She did no homework, she refused to go downstairs for dinner, she doodled and fiddled with her phone and planned out things she wasn’t going to say to her parents but really wanted to. She did not put Tikki down. She chose a big sweater and tucked Tikki into the hood while she drew or the pocket while she paced. 

“Chat knows who I am,” she said. 

She had come to a stop by the ladder to her little loft bed. She hadn’t put it together before that moment. She had been a mess of emotions and hadn’t stopped to think it through. But he did. He had brought Tikki back to her because he knew who she was now. He went to her school or had somehow followed her into school without being noticed. 

He knew and hadn’t even said hello. 

As though she had called him, there was a tap on her roof hatch. She looked up at it and scrambled to make her hair lie flat. She was still wearing the old jeans and the baggy sweater but halfway through worrying about that she remembered it was Chat. If he couldn’t deal with her being normal and wearing shirts three sizes too big, well, maybe that would be a good thing in the long run. 

“Try flirting with this, cat burgler,” she told the mirror, fluffing up her hair again with her fingers. She climbed up the ladder and pushed the hatch back. It was him. Who else could possibly be knocking on the door of a fourth-story balcony? 

He flashed her a bright grin. Too many teeth and he wiggled his eyebrows at her. He would probably flirt with a potato. It was as dark as it ever got in the middle of the city and his eyes caught a flash of light and glowed like a real cat’s. He held out a hand and she took it, letting him pull her up onto the terrace beside him. He could do it easily, lift her with one hand without even trying. Jealousy rolled through her. She wanted her transformation back. She pulled her hands back and wrapped them around Tikki inside the big pocket of her sweater. 

“Thank you,” she said. 

“Anything for you, My Lady,” he said. 

“Don’t start with that,” she said pointing a finger at his nose. 

It earned her another smile. She hit the switch and turned on the little overhead light. Something about him looming over her, all smiles and glowing eyes in the dark, was too much. He was here. On Marinette’s rooftop. That was too much all on its own. 

“Is your Kwami any better?” he asked and he might have been another person in that moment. Gentler and genuinely worried. This was the thing she hated most about all Chat Noir’s flirting. Underneath it, somewhere hidden down behind the puns and the glib retorts and the silly smiles, was this other person. Every time she was reminded that he was in there, it just confused everything. 

“She’s the same, but she’ll get better. Right?” she said. 

“That’s what Plagg says but he’s a little unsure how long it will take,” he said. 

“Plagg?” she asked. 

“Mine has a name, he’s Plagg,” Chat told her. 

“Tikki, she’s Tikki,” Marinette said pulling her out of the hoodie pocket and holding her out in both hands so that Chat could see her. He smiled, just one corner of his lip quirking up and he pat her on the head. His claw looked menacing over Tikki’s tiny head but he was gentle.  

“Until she’s better it’s just you,” Marinette said. 

“My Lady isn’t worried about me, is she?” Chat said. 

He was leaning, his little worried smile over Tikki morphing into this flirty monstrosity. With the light hanging right over him, his features were all cast into sharp relief. He didn’t look cute or familiar. For a moment, he looked unnerving and alien. 

“You go to my school, you jerk,” she said kicking out at his ankle to knock him off balance. He hopped out of the way and pursed his lips at her but it put him out in the regular circle of the lamp light again and he looked like himself. Goofy and annoying and familiar. 

“I knew you were waiting to yell at me,” he laughed. 

“Is that why you snuck her back into my bag without so much as a word? Because you think this is a funny game? I thought she was dead,” Marinette snapped at him. She still held Tikki in her hands and cradled her a little closer as she said the words. Saying it out loud hurt. She turned away from Chat and looked out at the city until her breathing slowed again. No more crying and she was never going to cry in front of him. Not ever. 

He leaned against the rail beside her. His elbows propped up against the metal and his fingers dangling out over the empty space. His claws made his fingers too long as they should have been, they trailed down to sharp points. She didn’t look over at him. His hands were the only part of him in her field of vision. 

“Your parents didn’t hurt her. They were just trying to protect you. They were worried about you,” Chat said. 

“Because they think I am a little kid who can’t take care of herself,” she said. 

“Or because they love you,” he said. 

She did look at him then. He was staring forward, his eyes shining again in the partial light. The lamp was behind them and she couldn’t see his face clearly, just his halo of hair and that flash of green. He tilted his head up to her and the movement was so catlike that she smiled and let some of her annoyance go. 

“Thank you for bringing her home,” Marinette said. 

“Anything for you, Bug,” he said. 

“Are you going to tell me your name?” she asked. 

“Chat Noir?” he suggested turning his attention back to the city fast enough to flick his hair into his eyes. She couldn’t see his face at all. 

“Are you not the one who has wanted to know since we met?” she asked. 

“You’re going to be disappointed, normal me isn’t hero material,” he said flipping around and leaning against the rail. He crossed his arms in front of his chest and looked down at her. His expression was unreadable. 

“And I am?” she snorted and tucked Tikki away again so she could mirror his posture. She tilted her chin up and held his gaze. He blinked at her. Big green eyes. Once then again. His unreadable expression became a half smile and that tilted head. 

“Absolutely you are,” he said and he might have said more but there was a call from downstairs. Just her name but it made them both jump. She looked back at the hatch and the glow from the room below and sighed.

“I have to go try and make peace,” she said. 

“Go on then, see you at school,” he said. 

“I’ll figure it out,” she hissed but he was already dropping over the railing and she went back inside to sit with her hands folded around Tikki while her parents talked to her. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh look at me, writing Marichat on the rooftop balcony!
> 
> I feel like I should get a fandom badge. It's like you're not really a Miraculous Ladybug Fanwriter until you've written some variation of this scene. 
> 
> Also look at me sticking to an update schedule! Who is this person and what did she do with the real me?


	4. Frown Lines and Fan Blogs

“You’re staring,” Alya said. 

“I am not,” Marinette said. 

"Pretty sure you are and the Quatrième class cannot possibly be that interesting," Alya said. 

"I was just spacing out. It's been a weird week," she said sitting back against the bench and staring at the ceiling instead. The supports rattled as one of the classes above let out and kids came pounding out into the open air. She didn't look up as they came down the stairs, just listened to the way the sound of feet was different on the steps than on the floor. 

"You really are spacing out," Alya said. 

"Yeah," Marinette said sitting up again and then falling all the way forward to lean on her knees. She hadn't had any luck figuring out who Chat was and apparently staring at the other grades on their way to and from class wasn't helping. She let Alya drag her to her feet. They had linked arms as they headed toward math class when Marinette had a terrible idea. 

"Have you had any luck figuring out who Ladybug is?" she asked. 

"Haven't even found a good clue since the lost textbook," Alya said with a sigh, "I should have marked it or something. Even my tips box on the blog has been quiet. I haven't even got any of the really wonky ones in more than a week. There's a guy, I think he's a guy, same person though, even on anon I am sure it's the same guy, he thinks Ladybug is Angela Merkel. I guess she just pops over from Berlin whenever we have an Akuma attack. No time to run a country, I need to go to Paris now!" 

Marinette laughed. She leaned on Alya and trusted her friend to steer her through the students. That was her always her mistake. Alya could only be trusted so far. She bumped into someone and snapped her head up to see a startled looking Adrien, far far too close to her face. She attempted to back off and ended up stepping on his foot. He winced and tried to help her. Alya tried to catch her as well. 

They spun. 

Her arms pinwheeled and she somehow ended up with her back against Adrien's chest and his hands on her arms. It kept her from falling over. He was warm. He smelled nice. She was close enough to tell that he smelled nice. Too close. Far too close. She looked up at him and he had his eyebrows drawn together and an awkward smile on his face. She jerked out of his hold and managed to stay up on her own two feet as she turned to face him. 

"Sorry, so sorry, I gotta, go, yes, go, sorry," she said and then rushed into class before she could make it worse. His eyes were so green and it threw off all her thoughts. His hair had looked good even after she’d knocked him over and it had fallen in his eyes. 

Alya was smiling at her as they sat down. Marinette raised her eyebrows and Alya gave her an impudent shrug. The teacher wasn’t ready yet so Marinette leaned over and hissed, "You did that on purpose."

"It didn't go the way I was hoping. I was hoping for more romantic, sweeping you off your feet kind of thing. Less punching and foot stomping," Alya admitted. 

"Oh no, I did punch him, didn’t I?" Marinette dropped her head to her desk with a hollow thunk. Alya reached over and patted her shoulder but the teacher was starting and there were some classes you just didn't speak in if you valued your life. Marinette dragged her heavy, stupid head up and pretended to pay attention to the teacher at the front of the room. 

It wasn't until the class had let out that she could ask Alya, "What about Chat Noir? Do you have any idea who he is?" 

"You like blondes, don't you?" Alya said. 

"It is not like that, stop it," Marinette said, "It's just you don't hear so many theories for who he is."

"You've just been looking in the wrong places. There are blogs. There are so many blogs. Hot boy in leather? There are blogs. I'll make a list of links for you. Do you want the ones that are more 'theories' or more 'hot boy in leather' or both?" Alya said. 

"Theories, just theories, I don't want to know about the other. I don't want to know what his fan sites are like. Please don't ever tell me," she said. 

"Fan sites for who?" 

Marinette winced and did not turn around. Adrien sat at the front of the class and should have already left. She did not need a repeat of her moment of panic. Oh god, she was going to say something even stupider now. He was right there behind her. It was weird not to turn around. She was being weird again. She just needed to turn around and smile because that's what you did when you spoke to a classmate. Alya, traitorous Alya, was already telling him about her new found interest in Chat Noir. 

She turned around and smiled. He was grinning like he'd been told an enormous joke but he faltered when he met her eye. He started to say something but then just shrugged. How did one shrug elegantly? Apparently it was something models knew how to do because he made it look like a dance move. She dropped her attention back to her papers. She stacked up her class notes - not that she remembered what class had been about - and picked up her bag. 

Adrien backed off as she stood, giving her room in case she was going to step on him or accidentally push him down the stairs. He had drawn his eyebrows together into that same tiny little frown from when he had caught her. It was adorable. The urge to reach up and smooth that frown line away was almost as strong as her urge to run like something was chasing her. Running was safer than touching. 

"Biology," she said as a means of explanation before beating a hasty retreat. If she stayed, she would just embarrass herself further. Out in the hallway she skittered around a corner and stopped to take a deep breath. She knocked her head against the wall behind her and kept her eyes shut until she was calm again. 

She opened up her bag to check on Tikki. It was becoming a nervous tick. Every time Tikki was curled up there in the same scarf she’d been sent home wrapped up in, she breathed easier. Every time Tikki didn’t respond, her breathing hitched again. How long was this recovery going to take? 

“I need you,” she told Tikki. 

All she got in answer was silence, not even a twitch of an antenna. Marinette trudged on to her class. 

Biology blended into homeroom and she was staring at the back of Adrien’s head thinking about another blonde boy. He had a little piece of hair out of place, it flipped up at an odd angle and she wanted to smooth it flat for him. She wanted a lot of things she couldn’t have. Adrien fell into step beside her on the way out of class and she snapped her head up to look at him for a moment before ducking away. 

And almost into a pole. She careened sideways to avoid the support pole for the walkway above. That maneuver meant she almost crashed into Adrien. She jerked away from that possibility and almost hit the next pole before managing to stubble into a clear path. Just walk in a straight line, she tried to remind herself. Just be normal.

He followed along with her and she stopped in panic. She'd ducked into a hallway at random so she could avoid him and now she wasn't sure how to go back without admitting that the stairs to the principal's office where not where she wanted to be. She plastered a smile on her face and looked up at Adrien. He was frowning again. That adorable little line was back between his eyes. 

"Are you alright?" he asked. 

"Yes, fine, yes, very, fine, good," she said. 

She hated that she did this. Adrien appeared and her mind's ability to put words into an order that approached sensible fled. Then she fled but he was standing between her and the way she wanted to go so she either had to run up the stairs and find a reason for it or squeeze past him. Apologizing and asking him to move should have been a possible solution but that would require words that made sense. 

“Are you sure?” he said.

He tilted his head a little as he spoke and his hair fell across his forehead. The school around them was emptying and the sounds of their classmates leaving for the day were getting farther and farther away. She was very nearly alone with Adrien. Adrien who was just a boy. Just a boy. She knew lots of boys but none of them made her chest tighten like this one. 

“Marinette?” he asked. 

It sounded like the start of a sentence but then above them there was a crash. She was still staring at Adrien and he barely flinched, just looked up at the ceiling above them. His attention snapped back to her and he started to say something again. Bright and awake and almost excited. 

Idiot. 

Did she have a crush on an idiot? 

She hadn't thought he was an idiot.

“It’s could be an Akuma, we need to leave,” she said just in case that look was because he hadn’t figured it out yet. 

She grabbed his sleeve and yanked him forward. She was very careful that she didn’t touch his actual arm, just his shirt. She skirted the stairs to the principal’s office and though she could hear stomping above them, she couldn’t see anything. Adrien stumbled but caught up to her quickly. Her hand fell to her bag, ready to snap it open and let Tikki out as soon as she’d gotten Adrien clear of the building. 

But that wasn’t going to happen. 

Tikki was still asleep. She froze for a moment and Adrien kept moving. Her caught her with his entire arm around her shoulder and headed for the nearest exit. He was going fast now. 

Maybe he wasn’t such an idiot. 

That was a relief. 

“Stay here, I’ll go see if I can find help,” he said pushing her into a classroom. She whirled on him but he’d already shut the door on her and his sneakers were slapping against the tile as he ran back into the school. He was going to wrong way. 

So he was an idiot then. 

“What do I do now, Tikki?” she asked but there wasn’t an answer. She hesitated by the door and couldn't decide what to do.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can you imagine the fan blogs that would exist in-world for Chat Noir? 
> 
> Just take a minute.... did you get to oh my god? because I did. 
> 
> Also I'm still awake on the day that started on the 9th so this isn't late. It's still the 9th somewhere, ok?


	5. Hose Pipes and High Voltage

Adrien hesitated in front of the classroom door before running toward the quad. Marinette was safe. Marinette was Ladybug. He kept forgetting that. How did Ladybug stutter and nearly walk into poles? She did. That he wasn't expecting it didn't make it less true. Ladybug wasn't going to stay in the classroom, he knew that and he didn't want to get caught mid change. 

"Run toward the Akuma rather than risk being seen by the girl you like, good decision, Agreste," he muttered to himself as he ran. He grabbed door handles as he went waiting to find one that turned. When one did, he skidded to a stop and slipped inside. He flicked out his pockets and Plagg drifted up from inside his jacket, glowering.

"Lovely ambiance," Plagg said. 

They were standing in a utility closet. Adrien had bumped into the mop bucket as he'd stepped inside and sloshed bleach scented water onto his jeans. There was barely enough room to turn around in the closet but he didn't need much space to transform. He still managed to cause a cascade of mops and brooms in the process and stumbled backwards out of the closet. Graceful. He made it out into the open area to see a skinny woman with electricity crackling at her finger tips execute a near perfect double twist as she dropped off the second floor railing and onto the tarmac between the basketball nets. 

"Madam Mendeleiev?" he said.

She spun to look at him. Her hair was a very bright purple and much longer than he remembered it from class that afternoon. It also stuck straight up and when the electricity flickered between her fingers it also traveled up from the roots to the tips of her hair. He snapped out the baton and extended it, prepared to spin a shield if he needed it. 

"I am Electra," she growled. 

"Shocking," he said tilting his head and grinning at her. 

She flung a ball of purple electricity at him and he got the shield up in time but the shock hit the baton and knocked it out of his hand. He jumped back, dancing away from three more hits and shaking the pain out of his arm. He caught hold of one of the support beams and swung around it. 

Was it the one Marinette had almost smashed her face into? That thought wasn't helpful. He used the momentum of the swing to launch himself onto the railing of the stairs and run up to the second level. Speed and the high ground gave him a temporary advantage and when he dove for the ground he caught his baton on the first roll and was on his feet where he had started.  

He caught movement out of the corner of his eye. He didn't look towards it. He kept Electra's attention on him with terrible electricity jokes and attacks that didn't help. He was going to need to find something that wasn't the baton. Every time he managed to land a hit, he just got a shock that numbed his arms and left him reeling. 

"Metal is an excellent conductor, did you know?" he asked the Akuma. 

The flicker of movement was Marinette. Of course it was Marinette. He set his jaw and and used the baton to vault rather than attack and hit his physics teacher square in the face with a round house kick that knocked her sideways and unbalanced her. He used her distraction to close the distance between himself and Marinette. She yelped as he grabbed her around the waist and jumped up to the second level. He didn't put her down until he'd pushed her into the principal's office where the Principal was staring with vacant eyes as electricity crawled over his skin. 

"Bad performance review, do you think?" Marinette asked and she was all Ladybug, the stuttering girl was gone. He stared at her for a moment too long and she raised her eyebrows at him. Calm and confident. Ladybug without the costume. He wanted to ask her what had changed but there wasn't time for it. 

"You are not going to get hurt," he said. 

"You are not going to get anywhere using a big metal stick," she said flicking it. 

"Do you have a better idea?" he asked. 

"Get her off the ground until I've managed to find all the taps," Ladybug said. 

Not Ladybug. Marinette. He held her gaze. She was just a girl. She didn't have any powers or a suit to protect her. If she got hurt, it was going to be his fault. His lips were a tight line and his heart was beating too fast but his thoughts caught up with her. Taps. Water. She was going to flood the basketball court. It held water. The school had been talking about doing a fundraiser to install proper drainage. It was a good idea and he wouldn't be able to do it on his own. 

"I will not take any risks with your safety," he said. 

"Silly kitty," she tapped his nose but whatever she was going to say next was lost in the crash of the officedoor. The Akuma had followed them. An image of Marinette, vacant and crackling with electricity crossed his mind. It would be his fault. She was his responsibility until she got her powers back. He grabbed her arm and put himself between her and Electra. Marinette pulled out of his grasp and he didn't see where she went because he was keeping his eyes on the threat. 

"Stick to the plan and we'll be fine," she said. 

Electra threw a bolt of electricity. He caught it with the spinning baton. His muscles spasmed and he readjusted his grip to keep from losing the weapon. He looked over his shoulder to see the window was open. 

She hadn't. 

He took a few swings at Electra to push her back toward the door and then went to lean out the window. 

She had. 

Marinette who had almost walked into a pole not ten minutes earlier had just climbed out of a second story window and onto the ledge. He cast around but he couldn't see her. 

"This is the opposite of not taking risks," he yelled after her but didn't get an answer. 

The fight was back on as he pushed Mme. Mendeleiev into the hall. He got backed into another room and suddenly and they were tearing up the Quatrieme classroom. A table displaying some project cracked under his weight as he used it to launch himself forward for another attack. She caught the baton and swung him around and the sustained current was worse than the shocks had been. He let the baton go and hit the wall with shuddering muscles. He had thought he was fine. He'd bounce back from every other shock easily. This was worse. Even with the contact gone, his fingers were spasming. 

"Give me the ring," she said coming towards him with another ball of purple energy in hand. 

He said a silent prayer to Ladybug and Marinette and Tikki the unconscious Kwami and anything else that might be listening that she was ready and threw himself sideways. He wasn't moving smoothly but he didn't need grace for this. He glanced down and saw the flicker of sunlight glinting off of something wet and said another prayer. Feeling was coming back but he was going to be in trouble if he took another hit. 

The Akuma was following and he barely managed to roll away from the purple blast. He inhaled, curled his hand into a fist and made sure that when the roll ended it was underneath him. He kept his eyes closed. It was a risk but he was out of better ideas. Mme Mendeleiev cackled something and when she leaned down to flip him over and get his hand, he grabbed her wrist, caught her in the stomach with both feet and launched her over the rail. 

She yelled or he yelled. Someone yelled. 

His vision was blurring from the shock of grabbing hold of her electrified hand and he had to lie still for a moment to wait for the strength to come back. Marinette. She was down there and she was going to try and do something to fix this if he didn't. That thought pulled him back to himself and he stumbled to his feet and held himself up against the rail to look down and see that the Akuma was shuddering on the wet floor. Guilt washed through him. If it hurt as much as it had hurt him, well, he really hoped she wouldn't remember it. 

He grit his teeth. 

"This is going to hurt," he said to no one. It was unsettling to be in the middle of a battle by himself. He cast around for Marinette but couldn't see her. Good. Maybe she had finally gone someplace safe. 

Electra was wearing heavy gloves like she had just come from doing experiments with high voltage. It was either the gloves or her glasses. He was going to have to drop down into the electrified water and take them off her. He gave himself another second to talk himself into it before vaulting the rail and dropping into the water. The court was made of some high tech surface that wasn't designed to be open to the elements. All the students had to skirt it during rain storms because it got slippery as the water built up. 

The little bit of water was enough to conduct the electricity and it did hurt. Without the suit it might have killed him. He broke her glasses first and when that didn't work pulled off her gloves. He dug his claws into the fabric and pulled them apart. The shuddering in his muscles was getting bad again. As soon as the Akuma fluttered out of the remains of the heavy fabric the electricity stopped and he gasped in relief. His physics teacher was lying on the ground on her back in the water. She was herself again. Any moment, she was going to start yelling and trying to give Marinette detention for unauthorized use of the gardening hose. 

"Chat Noir!" he heard and Marinette was throwing something at him. She stood on the stairs, shoes dry. He had to dive for the thing she threw to him. Her aim suffered without the suit. Water splashed up into his face as he landed badly. Stupid electricity made everything harder. It was a snack box. A little snap top plastic container like a little kid might use to carry grapes or crackers to school. 

"I can't cleanse it. Don't let it get away!" Marinette yelled when he stared up at her with his sopping hair dripping into his eyes and the little plastic box held in both hands. 

What followed was embarrassingly close to something he'd once seen in a cat video on the internet but after too much flailing after the little purple thing, he got into the container and snapped the lid on. He held it up in triumph to Marinette. She wasn't looking at him. She was looking up at the Principal who had appeared at the top of the stairs, no longer immobilized. 

"Are you injured?" he asked Marinette. 

"No, but Adrien was still here too, sir," she said. 

"Everyone was evacuated but you," Chat said before the principal could send out people to search for him and make his day even more complicated. 

"Please go home, Mlle Dupain-Cheng. You'll be safer there," the principal said. 

Chat Noir wanted to argue with him. He needed Ladybug to help him figure out what to do with a captured Akuma but as far as anyone else knew, Ladybug wasn't there. Marinette held his gaze but then she adjusted her bag and did as she was told. Just a student. Just another kid being sent home in the event of emergency. As far as anyone else could know, he was the only hero in the room. He flashed a smile at the adults and then turned and ran the other direction out of the school. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How much of an asshole Plagg is in this story is my favourite. I'm going to write him more scenes just so he can snark at Adrien more often. 
> 
> Also yes... I am using the captured Akuma thing again. Sue me.


	6. Warring Families and Wet Cats

"There was an Akuma attack at school today," Marinette said when she sat down at the kitchen table. She adjusted her cutlery and pretended to be normal. She was wearing another sweater with big pockets and tucked her hand down into the one where Tikki was hidden. Dinner smelled fantastic and she tried not to think about how bad an idea skipping coming home for lunch had been. She was hungry.

Maybe that was why she said it. She was hungry and it made her cranky. She could almost hear Tikki's voice telling her off for starting arguments. It wasn’t Tikki, Tikki didn’t twitch.

"And you're here, safe," her mother said immediately.

"I am now but when it was happening, I had to climb out of the window and into the next one. I was on the second floor. It would have been easier with super powers," she said.

"Marinette," her mother said.

A look passed between her parents. Her father raised his chin and her mother leaned against the table and forced a smile. Marinette dropped her attention to her empty plate and the conversation blew away.

Her mother served. Her father explained what new ingredients he had put in. They talked about a new order that had come in at the bakery, about some cousin that was getting married, Marinette told the story of walking into the pole trying not to embarrass herself in front of her crush and everyone laughed. It was normalcy painted over cracks but it felt almost real when they were laughing.

"So there was a new Ladybug then?" her mother asked as the meal came to an end. She turned to Marinette with a big smile like she'd just realized something marvelous.

"No, Mama," she said, "I don't think it works like that. Chat Noir's like me. He can't choose someone else. He's just another normal person trying to do something to protect people."

She said it as kindly as she could but after she'd said it, she couldn't stay at the table. She left her dishes. That was a cardinal sin in her mother's kitchen. Dishes were put into the dishwasher immediately but she needed space from that big bright smile. Her mother was so fond of Ladybug. She always had been. She was so excited by the idea of a new Ladybug. Anyone just as long as it wasn't Marinette herself.

"I am Ladybug, me," she said as she closed her bedroom door. There was only lamp one up here and everything was cast in shadow. She wanted to climb out the hatch and go run the rooftops but that wasn't a choice. She could be down there with her mother's enthusiasm for a new Ladybug or she could be up here. There wasn't a third option anymore. She sighed.

"I know that," he said.

She squeaked and threw the nearest thing she could grab - a math textbook. He ducked out of the way and grinned at her. His hair was damp and curling at the ends and his eyes were luminous in the dark. He had his arms crossed over his chest. The words she had told her mother came back to her, "Just a normal person," but in the dark he didn't look normal. She didn't like this part of her life invading her private space.

"You are inside my room," she said.

"It's raining," he said with a shrug.

"That isn't an excuse for breaking and entering," she snapped throwing another book at him. Physics this time. This one he caught. He picked up both books and brought them back to her. He held them out like a little boy apologizing to his teacher. His fingers shook as she took them and dropped them back on the desk. She took his hand and held it in both of hers.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"Too much electricity," he said.

"Are you hurt? You don't get hurt in the suit."

"I'm almost back to normal."

"You're shaking, Chat, I can feel it, sit down."

She pushed him down into her rolling chair and he looked up at her. That little boy look was back. She felt his hand carefully. The tremours were minor. In anyone else, she might not have even noticed. He didn't take his hand back and he didn't look away from her. Those eyes were so green and they were locked on her. His hair was longer when it was wet, the weight of the water pulling it down into his face.

"How badly were you hurt? I saw you fall but I thought you were faking it," she said.

"I was halfway faking it," he said lazily, like it didn't matter.

"What do you need?" she asked.

"A kiss to make it better?" he said.

"Don't start," she said.

He pouted. The wet hair and the little tremour in his fingers and way he was looking up at her made quite the picture. The sarcastic fur ball was adorable. She caught her smile and twisted it into disapproval but he'd seen it and his pout became an answering grin and a wink.

"What did you do with the Akuma?" she asked.

He went back to the window ledge he had been sitting on when she had entered the room and came back with the little plastic container. It had a cheery blue lid like all the ones in the kitchen downstairs. She kept cookies in it for when Tikki needed a snack. Now there was a purple butterfly in it, fluttering it's wings and looking perfectly innocent.

Chat stood beside her as they looked at it. His shoulder brushed hers and it all hit her at once. He was here in her room. An Akuma was here in her room. Her mother would never believe that she was capable of helping anyone. Her father would just keep looking uncomfortable and worried every time the topic came up. Her secret identity was gone. Her powers were gone until Tikki recovered.

She had never felt so useless in her life. For a moment breathing was impossible. Every attempt to suck in a breath threatened to become a sob but she pulled it all back together. There were some people she was never going to cry in front of and Chat Noir was on the top of the that list.

“So it’s trapped?” she said once she was sure her voice was even.

“Seems to be,” he said.

"That’s good enough, let's get cocoa and climb the tower," she said.

"Pouring rain, no super suit," he said.

"I can't stay here, I need to do something, Chat, anything. Just an hour. You can borrow a sweater and sleep on my settee when we get back if you're worried about being cold. I’ll lend you the duvet," she said.

He stared at her. They stood shoulder to shoulder. Just barely but undeniably touching. Tikki slept in her pocket between them and the Akuma on the desk fluttered weakly and her parents downstairs clinked dishes together and talked in low even voices. She had just offered Chat Noir a sleep over and he hadn't said anything sarcastic or flirty about it. He was looking at her with that considering expression that always unnerved her.

 _Make a terrible comment_. She was silently daring him to say something obnoxious. She wanted him to. It would break the moment and she needed this moment to break. She needed this tension to break. There was too much tension, she couldn't have it with him too.

"Who are you?" she asked when he said nothing.

He laughed. A bark that was too loud and made them both look at the floor. He retreated, the moment had shattered, the shards of it were all around her. She had expected to feel better for having him look away. Somehow, this wasn't better.

"Today, you defeated the Akuma without your lucky charm, without your yo-yo, without the super strength, you just figured it out," he said.

"You -" she started but he cut her off,

"I helped. I got wet and electrocuted because I was wearing the suit and I could survive it. You won that fight," he said.

"You're selling yourself short," she said.

"I'm not what you're expecting," he said.

"You don't know what I'm expecting," she said stomping away a few steps before turning back and starting to pace, "And you should probably know that before that Akuma appeared, I almost smashed my face into a pole, twice, and then almost walked into a wall because… because I’m a mess. I am a mess. I have always been a mess. I am nothing without my powers."

She stopped. She had been getting loud. She brought her voice back down, crossed her arms so that she would stop waving them and crossed the room to Chat who was watching her silently. She wanted to demand he leave. She wanted to demand he tell her everything. She wanted to demand he stay because she didn't want to do this alone.

"You're incredible," he said.

"You're a such a flirt," she said turning around before he could do something like reach out and touch her.

"I mean it," he said but she just shook her head like she could shake away the words. He was nice. No, charming. Charming was the word she was looking for. Handsome and confident and a little bit arrogant but never, ever cruel. He probably did mean it but that didn't make him any less of a flirt. Charming and smooth, all pick up lines and sly grins.

Still, he was her Chat Noir.

"I trust you," she said. He frowned and she pushed on, "I would still trust you if you turned out to be just about anyone but Chloe Bourgeois but you don't have to tell me if you aren't ready. I get it. I didn't want anyone to know. I still don't want anyone to know but that doesn't change that they do. You don't have to tell me. I'll stop asking."

"Marinette," he said.

Her name in his voice made her flinch. He must have seen it because he fell silent. When she got up the courage to turn and look at him, he was standing with his feet set apart and his hands on his hips. He flashed her a grin and held out his hand. She swallowed every sarcastic thing she could have said to him and came over to take it.

Peace. Please. She needed peace with just one of the people who mattered.

"You're going to have to buy the cocoa because I don't think they'll sell it to me dressed like this," he said.

"Done," she said smiling with relief.

"And we're not going up the tower, it gets slippery in the rain and you can't catch us without the yo-yo," he said.

"Anywhere, then, take me anywhere," she said.

"Go get your coat then, my Lady," he said with a little bow.


	7. Takeaway Cups and Trust Falls

She wore a rain jacket and he carried her piggyback style with her arms tight around his neck. When he went fast enough that the rain was stinging she turned her face into him and breathed into his neck. He went faster and got bolder. From sticking to the row houses with their continuous rooftops, he started making vaults across boulevards. She tightened her hold and whooped as they fell from a baton vault that put them well above the skyline. When he landed after that one, she was laughing in his ear and he stopped to let her down to catch her breath. She kept a hand on his arm as she looked over the edge of the building they were on.

"That is terrifying without my suit," she said.

"You're smiling," he said.

"It was awesome," she said.

She was grinning like she'd just had the best experience of her life. Her hair where it peaked out of her hood was plastered to her forehead. All of Marinette's discomfort and stuttering was gone. Just gone. This girl was pure Ladybug, glittering and grinning and beautiful without her mask. She didn't have the suit but she didn't need it. He reached out before he had thought about it and pushed her hair back from her eyes. She looked up at him and for a moment she was uncomfortable and he dropped his hand but her smile was already back before it had fallen to his side.

"We should do this the other way sometime," she said.

"The other way?" he asked.

"Me in the suit, you not. It's scarier when you know you can't catch yourself," she said.

"You don't seem too worried," he said.

"You won't drop me," she said.

"Never," he said.

She got closer to him. She slid into his personal space and his smile flickered in surprise. Her hand came up and he thought that she was going to put it on his chest but she just set a finger on his shoulder. The rain picked up and pounded around them, drowning out every other sound in the city.

"But for that you'd have to. Tell. Me. Who. You. Are," she said poking him repeatedly in the shoulder with each word.

"You don't like the mystery?" he asked.

She dropped her head back, "Augh. How about a clue?"

"I'm a boy," he said.

"Are you? Really? I thought you were a cat," she said.

"Not always," he said.

"A real clue," she said.

"Go buy us some cocoa and I'll think of a good one," he said.

He helped her climb down the side of the building they'd landed on. He climbed down onto a dumpster roof and reached up for her. She dropped into his hold with a kind of perfect trust that he hadn't been so aware of when she was Ladybug. He caught her around the waist and swung her around and lowered her down onto the ground.

"I like it with whip cream," he said.

"You have a sweet tooth?" she asked.

"That's not a clue," he said.

"I'm going to collect up enough details and then I'm going to find you at school and slap you for this elaborate game," she said.

"You wouldn't slap me," he said.

"If you keep creeping into my bedroom, I might," she said.

"Noted," he said.

She disappeared around the corner, skirting puddles. She had had the jacket in her room but no boots. Her feet were in little slippers and were going to be freezing later. She came back a little while later with a pair of take away cups. The desire to change back and just take her back inside to share the drinks in the warmth was almost overwhelming.

"So where are you taking me?" she asked.

The desire went away. He held out a hand and she gave him his cup and he took a sip and then handed it back. He grabbed her by the shoulders and turned her around to steer her down the alley. She carried the drinks and he steered her into Parc des Buttes-Chaumont. She shot him a smile over her shoulder when she realized where they were. If she hadn't just threatened to slap him, he might have kissed her for that smile.

"You've got a good hold on those?" he asked.

"Is this going to be a smooth ride?" she asked.

"Only soft landings for you, My Lady," he said.

She had more trouble balancing with the cups in hand but he took her down into the grotto and then up to the top of the waterfall. They'd been to the park before but they'd rarely gone into the grottos and never come up here. Marinette looked delighted. They had managed not to spill the drinks and she handed him his as he settled in beside her.

He didn't touch her but he sat close enough that when she leaned past him to watch the water fall that her shoulder brushed his. She had pushed her hood back and shook out her damp hair. She kept her cup held in both hands. Marinette was a friend but not someone it had ever occurred to him to study the details of. She was a collection of details. Smiles and bright blue eyes and her hands were always moving. She wasn't wearing any earrings while hers were still curled up with Tikki. Details.

"Was this worth sneaking out for?" he asked.

"Completely, thank you," she said.

Then she put her elbow on his shoulder and leaned in so that she was almost talking into his ear and he froze. Details. This was just another detail. She smelled like rain water and chocolate. He didn't look at her. If he turned his head toward her, she was going to be close enough to kiss. That wasn't something he could handle. He forced himself to lift his cup and take a drink of sugary hot cocoa and then lower it. She was still leaning on him and looking at him.

"Clue?" she asked.

"Right," he said.

"I don't forget," she said.

"I don't have a cat," he said.

"Not good enough, I'm not going to go around asking every boy at school if he has a cat. You're the one who suggested we could keep each other's secrets and now you're all shy about it," she said.

"I am shy," he said.

"And defensive," she said. Ladybug was teasing him. Marinette was teasing him. He wasn't sure which one unnerved him more. She sat back and balanced her coffee cup between her knees and started counting on her fingers, "And blonde and just a little bit taller than me and too fond of horrible puns. I want an actual detail. Something I don't already know."

"I'm pretty new to your school," he said.

"Like within the last year?" she asked.

"Yes," he said.

"Ok, that counts," she said.

He finally let himself look at her. She was leaning back against the stone and was looking up at the hole in the rock at the night sky. He took a moment to stare. She tapped her finger against her cup as she took a sip. When she looked over at him, he flashed her a grin that hopefully hid the hopeless staring.

"What?"

Or not.

"I believe it now," he said.

"What does that mean?" she asked.

"I look at you and I see Ladybug," he said.

"You're the only one," she said.

"They love you,” he said.

“Yeah, you said that before,” she said.

She sighed and he let the conversation go. They stayed up there until she started shivering. He took her back home by a route with as many stomach flipping drops as he could manage. She shrieked in his ear and wrapped her knees around his waist and didn’t complain when he let the route wind out past her family’s bakery before finally bringing her home. He smiled the entire time.

“You’re sure you’re not cold? You can come in, I really will lend you a sweater,” she said.

“I’ve got to get home before I get caught at this,” he said.

She narrowed her eyes at him.

“No spoiler,” he said and she smiled at him through the glare. He wanted to take her up on the offer. Just do it, Agreste, just say yes. Change back and follow her down into her room. She invited you. Except Marinette couldn’t talk to him. What if he ruined this friendship that wasn’t quite what they had as Ladybug and Chat Noir and wasn’t anything like what they had as Marinette and Adrien? He didn’t know what it was that he said that made her clam up and walk into walls.

“So?” she said.

“Another time maybe,” he said.

“Good night then, Kitty,” she said.

Then she vanished down into the trap door and left him standing alone to stare at where she had been and second guess himself all over again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Parc des Buttes Chaumont is beautiful. I wanted a Paris Landmark I hadn't seen before and the park isn't too far from their neighbourhood. 
> 
> Have you noticed the terrible mistake that these two have made? *evil grin*
> 
> (Also we've run out my lead of finished chapters and I'm headed into the "finals" zone so updates are going to get spottier for a little while)


	8. Empty Boxes and Emergency Plans

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some timeline notes since I started the damn fic before the season was over and now have to rejig it a little.. 
> 
> This is pre-Princess Fragrance (so Marinette isn't aware that taking Tikki to Fu as an option when she's sick/hurt). 
> 
> And this chapter has some pretty heavy Origins spoilers in it if you still haven't seen the Origins episode and are still avoiding spoilers.

Marinette stood below the trap door an scowled in Chat Noir’s direction. It had been good to be out and flying between buildings again even if it wasn’t in her suit. She wanted to be angry with him but she couldn’t find the rage. She shook her head and smiled instead.

She dropped down off the loft to her bedroom floor rather than climbing down. She wasn’t as strong outside the suit but it wasn’t that far. Her knees disagreed and she hit the floor hard and almost fell over. Giggling, running on an adrenaline high, she pinwheeled her arms to get her balance back.

And there on her desk, right where they’d left it, was the little plastic snack box. It lay on top of a magazine that she had bought just because it had Adrien’s new shoe ad in it. Everything looked so normal, just like it always looked.

Little plastic box.

Right where it should be.

Except the lid was popped off.

The Akuma was gone.

She just stared at it.

Stared at the little empty box. There were still cookie crumbs inside it, stuck to the bottom. Her attention went up first. Chat Noir might still be on her roof. She couldn’t hear him. All she could hear was the tinny sound of the television in the room downstairs. It was after eleven. Her parents were usually up before 4. They both kept baker’s hours. They didn’t stay awake to watch television this late no matter what was on.

“They noticed I was gone and stayed up to yell at me,” she said but it didn’t calm her nerves.

She crept to the stairs and paused. She wanted to go back and demand Chat Noir come with her but she had no proof that he was even still there and if she was right about the lecture she was about to get then it would make things worse. They were probably sitting downstairs, tired and worried and annoyed that their daughter had added disappearing in the middle of the night without a word to her list of hobbies. That was all it was. They would tell her they were disappointed and life would go on.

All the lights were still on downstairs. Cheery and bright and normal. The dishes were in the rack by the sink and the coffee machine was all set up for morning, just like it always was. She dragged her eyes away from the kitchen but couldn’t see them in the living room. She had stepped on the creaky step. She had done it on purpose, drawing out the step like ringing a buzzer. They should have come to meet her at the bottom.

She turned around and there they were.

The hallway led to the smaller bedroom that they used as an office. The computer, all the account books, the sample sketches for custom orders, everything was there. The big armchair in the corner had been Marinette’s favourite place to read when she’d been a kid. She still liked to sit there sometimes and do her homework while her parents worked.

Her parents stood by the desk. Her mother standing behind the desk and the chair knocked over behind her. Her father standing to one side as though he had been leaned over her to have a look at whatever was on the computer screen. There was a lamp on in the corner but the room was darker than the living room had been.

A little purple shock lit the room like lightning for just a flash before it was gone.

“Mama?” she said around the lump in her throat.

They were both stock still and had Madam Mendeleiev’s hair. Purple and sticking straight up. Her lab coat, her heavy purple gloves. The exaggerated features of the Akuma were painted over their faces. Their skin wasn’t quite the right colour and their eyebrows were as jagged and as purple as their hair. They still looked like themselves, under it all, they still looked like the people she knew.

Marinette crept closer with her heart hammering. A little spark of electricity traveled up her mother’s hair and fizzled at one of the purple points.

“Don’t touch her.”

Marinette jumped. Ladybug could have done it, could have grabbed the big glass paperweight that her mother had bought at an art fair and swung it like a weapon. Marinette caught hold of it but nearly fell in trying to get it up. Chat Noir caught her and hauled her away from her parents in the same movement.

“How did you-” she started.

“There are more on the street. I came back as soon as I saw them,” he said.

She was shaking. Shaking hard. Chat didn’t let go of her and he had the baton extended. Even her voice shook when she grabbed his wrist and said, “Don’t hurt my mother.”

“I won’t,” he said. “They’re going to be frozen until the Akuma makes it back to Mme. Mendeleiev.”

“This is my fault,” she said.

“It’s not, I never should have left the Akuma in your room,” he said.

“No, this is my responsibility,” she said. She whirled out of his hold and took two steps towards her parents who continued to stare at nothing and said it again, “This is my responsibility! Aren’t you alway saying that? That I need to take my responsibilities seriously? This was my responsibility and now there is nothing I can do to fix it!”

Her voice had gotten shrill and she snapped her mouth shut. Every muscle was tight. Her chest was tight and her breathing hitched. Chat Noir was behind her. His hands fell on her shoulders. She stayed as rigidly still as her Akumatized parents.

At the very top of the list of people she wasn’t going to cry in front of was Chat Noir but suddenly she didn’t care. He caught her when she turned. There were people who gave one armed, awkward hugs. Chat Noir was not one of them. He pulled her in tight and wrapped both arms around her and didn’t say a word when she pressed her face into his shoulder and let out a hiccuping sob.

He held her until she’d collected herself. It took longer than she wanted to admit. The tears were more anger than they were sorrow and it was harder to get a handle on the anger. She was shaking and crying and he still smelled like rain. She pulled back from him, wiping tears off her cheeks with the heel of her hand. He didn’t let go of her completely. His hands lingered on her arms and he watched her with concern in his eyes.

“What do we do now, Bug?” he asked.

She almost threw all that anger at him but he was looking at her like he did in the middle of a fight. There was concern in his face yes, but he was looking at her the way he did when he was waiting on her to see what she would do with the lucky charm. Like he trusted her. Like he thought she would have the answer. She wiped her eyes again and tried to shake her head clear.

“You go find Mme Mendeleiev. If she stays calm, then the Akuma can’t take her over again and everything stays like this. It gives us some time to figure out how to help Tikki,” she said.

“Are you going to stay here or come with me?” he asked.

“I’ll go stay at Alya’s, she won’t mind. I think it will just make things worse if I go with you. She’ll find a way to yell at me about my physics homework,” she said and the joke fell flat.

“I’ll take you there,” he said.

“No, Akuma first, it’s only a few streets over,” she said with a glance over her shoulder at her parents and their vacant eyes and purple hair.

She turned back to find him still looking at her. She wanted to shoo him away to start solving the problem but that would mean being alone with them like this. Chat pulled her forward. She resisted for a second then leaned in and let him wrap her up in a hug again. Just for a moment, she told herself, just for a moment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> School is kicking my ass!
> 
> Regular updates might resume in late April but at this point I feel like goddamn JULY is probably more optimistic. (grumble grumble this certificate had better actually be worth something at some point in my life unlike my stupid useless not-worth-the-paper bachelors degree)


	9. Student Absences and Statue Feet

Adrien hadn't slept. He also hadn't gone home and a vindictive part of him was hoping his father was worried that he'd been turned into an Akuma, another part of him was sure his father hadn't even noticed and Nathalie was running around trying to find him before she had to report his absence. He sat in a cafe around the corner from school. It had just opened and smelled of baking bread and fresh coffee. He was considering a second cup because there were still a few hours before classes even began and he was exhausted. 

He ran his finger along the saucer in lazy circles. He traced patterns in a drip of espresso against the white china and kept waiting for someone to remind him of his manners. He stared at the shiny flat black screen for a long time before he finally picked up his phone and called Nathalie to tell her a lie about staying at Nino's. Her voice was not even relieved to hear from him, just mildly annoyed. 

No one had even noticed he was missing yet. He wondered how long it would take before the phone had rung, before someone had noticed. They would have, eventually. 

He had spent the night at Mme Mendeleiev's flat. She was married to a little round woman who made tea and seemed flattered to have a superhero in her living room. They also had matching pink pajamas. On anyone else, he might have found it cute. His surly physics teacher in pink pajamas was just unsettling. She wasn't concerned about the Akuma coming back again. She claimed she was fine and he was worrying over nothing. At least she did until the early morning news had come on with a report of the frozen Akumatized people up and down rue Gottlieb but even the footage hadn't stopped her from insisting she would be going to work. Now, Adrien got to spend a day at school on no sleep making sure she wasn't upset enough to allow the Akuma to get back in. 

"This is not sharing hour," Mme Mendeleiev had told him when he'd tried to ask her if she knew what had attracted the Akuma in the first place. 

He'd finally agreed that there wasn't anything useful he could do by staying there. Mme Mendeleiev's wife, whose name he hadn't learned, had given him a little sack of pastries and a cup of tea to take with him and by that point he'd been too tired and out of sorts to come up with an argument against taking them. He'd gone back and eaten them on Marinette's balcony. 

She had been gone off to Alya's by then but he slipped back inside and checked on her parents for her. She'd left the lights in the little study on for them and he took a moment to stare. He wanted to hate them for what they had done to her but he couldn't find it in him. He left them in their brightly lit apartment and climbed back out of Marinette's window and found the first cafe that was open and got himself the coffee. 

Now he was drafting things he would say to Marinette because he needed her on this, with or without Tikki, he needed her. He needed her to help him come up with a plan and it felt too much like abandoning her when she didn't know who he was. He shouldn't have made her walk to Alya's alone. He should be able to phone her right now and make sure she was doing alright. He picked up his phone and scrolled through his numbers but Adrien didn't have hers. 

This was the end of the secrets. He was going to tell her everything. 

He was one of the first ones on campus and he wasn't surprised that even as the start of classes drew closer, the regular crowds didn't appear. People were staying home. 

Adrien ran upstairs as inconspicuously as he could and walked by the physics room to make sure that Mme Mendeleiev was still herself. She cast him a look from a pile of papers she was grading and on anyone else, that expression would have been concern for impending Akumatization but she never looked happy. He waved as normally as he could and pretended he didn't know that her pajamas were pink and fuzzy and her wife liked to serve tea when she was nervous. 

He was running out of things to do around school so he headed for homeroom. He had expected to find the room empty, maybe even still dark but it wasn't. 

"Hey! You're you! That's good," Nino said when he came through the door. 

"Yeah," he said, "I don't live close to where it happened." 

"You got any theories to add?" Max asked. 

"Theories?"

Of course there were theories. Ladybug had been missing for two Akuma attacks and the theories were flying thick and fast as to what had happened and when she was coming back. The kids who had shown up to class all had an idea. They sat around the lower desks as they waited for the teacher to arrive. Alix was swinging her feet and sitting on Chloe's desk. Chloe was nowhere to be seen but Sabrina kept giving Alix dirty looks. Adrien was only half listening to them. He was waiting for Marinette. 

Alya wheeled into class only minutes before the bell and said, "Which one of you has been kissing Marinette?"

"Mlle Cesaire please take a seat," Mme Bustier said. The teacher had been just behind Alya and stood in the doorway with her lips slightly pursed. She looked mildly annoyed or perhaps just perplexed that Alya was yelling about kissing in the classroom. Alya did as she was asked but she looked up and down the assembled students as they also found their way to their chairs. Her eyes lingered on Adrien but then she was behind him. 

Marinette didn't appear.

She wasn't in the hall behind Alya. She didn't make it to class at all and no one seemed to even notice. Lots of people had stayed home. The class derailed into talking about the attacks very quickly and Mme Bustier was full of empty reassurances and no one knew anything except what had been on the news. He tuned it all out and kept checking the door but it didn't open. No one came in late. 

He didn't need to find Alya after class. She found him and grabbed him by the elbow and hauled him around the corner. She did it with all the force that Chloe usually did but none of the lingering touches. She glared at him as students rushed by around them. Maybe someday she'd have the persuasive glare of an investigative reporter but right now it was just narrowed eyes and a set jaw. It was a little intimidating but all his thoughts were on Marinette and it didn't leave a lot of room for worrying about Alya being angry at him. 

"Is it you?" she asked. 

"I have no idea what you're talking about," he admitted. 

"Last night, Marinette sends me a text that says," she rummaged in her bag to pull out her phone and hold it up in front for his face so he could read it as she recited it from memory, "Weird request but can you tell people at school, 'Feet of the angels, where I kissed you.'" 

"What does that mean?" he asked. 

"Damn, I was hoping it was you," she said. 

"Why? What is going on? Where is Marinette?" he asked which was as close as he could get to telling her that the last he had seen Marinette she was headed for Alya's house because that would open a whole new set of questions about why he had been with Marinette in the middle of the night. He didn't want Alya putting him under her investigative journalism stare any longer than was strictly necessary.

"Probably at home, half the school stayed home and she lives right on the corner where it happened," Alya said. "It really wasn't you she was kissing?"

"Why would you think it was me?" he asked. 

"No reason," Alya said waving off the question but she gave him a wink and then ducked away from him. 

The next class was starting. He couldn't remember what his next class was. He stood in the hall as it emptied and held his bag tight to his chest like he needed something to hug. Irrationally, he had jumped to jealousy first. Marinette had kissed someone and needed to tell everyone at school about it. Panic came next because she hadn't gone to Alya's and if she hadn't gone to Alya's then he didn't know where she was. 

"She kissed me," he whispered aloud a moment later.  

He didn't remember the kiss but she had told him about it. Not Marinette. Ladybug. Ladybug had kissed him to break the spell when Dark Cupid's arrow had made him into a puppet. He remembered just the moment after, when she had still been holding his face and all he could see were her eyes. Then she had picked him up and flung him back into the fight. 

He slung his bag over his shoulder and ran for the stairs. Someone yelled after him but he didn't turn to see if it was a teacher or a friend or a custodian. He just kept running until he skidded to a stop in front of it. The fountain looked the way it always did. A little cluster of tourists were taking pictures. A woman wearing green was sitting on the edge scrolling through something on her phone. There was nothing about it that wasn't normal. 

"Feet. Angel feet," he said looking up at the fountain and the carvings. He heard Plagg make an exasperated noise from inside his pocket and Adrien muttered, "If anyone asks I'm going to tell them I'm talking to you." 

"That won't make them think you're any less of a sleep deprived lunatic," Plagg told him. 

"I'm about to climb a landmark, sleep deprived lunatic is probably nicer than some of the names I'm going to be called," he said. 

"Ugh, I can't believe I have to suggest it," Plagg said. 

"Oh, right," he said. 

He had to find an alley he could duck into to transform but it made climbing the fountain both easier and more noticeable. A teenager could have written it off as a dare but Chat Noir was going to draw attention so faster was better. He made the leap to the angel on the top of the plinth first but it was Marinette who had sent the message so he dropped down to the lower level and started checking feet. They weren't technically angels but he doubted she would have climbed all the way to the top if she didn't have to. He disturbed a flock of pigeons and had to grab onto the statue's clasped hands to keep from falling as he sneezed. 

It was there on the third statue he checked. 

She had wrapped up her purse in a dark blue t-shirt and tucked it in between the figure's feet and the statue of a bird. He held it in his hands and tried to stop his heart from pounding in alarm. 

There were people taking pictures. Why were these people still taking tours while there were at least fifteen Akumatized citizens standing on the street only a few blocks away? That wasn't a helpful thought. Sleep deprivation was getting to him. He couldn't open the bag here so he bowed and waved to the photographers and then used his baton to launch himself towards home. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have so much homework. (I don't actually, I've just done exactly none of the little bit I do have and I'm feeling guilty). 
> 
> I also started an entire new story today. 
> 
> If I suddenly drop off the face of the internet, assume it is because one of my groups murdered me for writing fic instead of doing useful project related things. 
> 
> In story notes: 
> 
> "Jeez Adrien, you are really dense on the Marinette has a crush on you and Alya basically just confirmed it" thing
> 
> I like the idea of this class, almost all of whom have been akumatized, being kind of more chill about the whole thing that most people and getting together in class early to discuss while most people are hiding at home. 
> 
> Also Adrien not being able to think clearly while sleep deprived is my new favourite headcanon. He probably hands in papers after all-nighters with lines like "and then main character Douche Face McRapist did something" left in. True fact, I came THIS CLOSE to doing that once: The only way I could get through writing the paper on that awful novel was to call the protagonist awful names and then I had to take them out in my final pass edit and replace them with his name. (the book is Disgrace by Coetzee and you're supposed to hate Rapey Adulterous Asswipe and it's a book about toxic masculinity so he's not held up as a hero but he's also the main character so you're stuck reading about him and I HATED HIM A LOT.)
> 
> Why is this note so long? Why did you read it all? I love you <3


	10. Attic Rooms and An Angry Old Man

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While it has a silly chapter title, this part of the story has a darker tone from what has come before it.

Marinette woke up slowly. She didn't remember falling asleep. Someone touched her hair and for a moment the heavy unease started to retreat. Only a moment. It wasn't her hair. Someone was touching her ear. Gloved fingers. Gentle enough but they were pushing hair out of the way and touching her ear lobe. 

She jerked away. 

"Good morning," a voice said. 

She was blind for a moment while she got her bearings back but that didn't stop her from moving away from the voice and those clinical fingers. It wasn't a bright room. All heavy shadows and a ceiling that rose into darkness somewhere above them, making the whole space seem infinite. She wasn't coordinated enough yet to get to her feet so she just pushed away on her hands and knees until she caught up against a wall. 

"Where am I?" she asked. 

If Marinette had stopped to think strategy, this would have been the one she would have chosen but it wasn't that calculated. She sounded like a scared little girl because she was scared. Her voice was smaller than she wanted it to be. She wanted to be Ladybug with all the confidence and power but she wasn't. She was just Marinette. Even her tongue wasn't working properly. Her words slurred a little bit on the edges. 

"What's wrong with me?" she asked in a voice that wasn't any clearer.

"The grogginess will pass, you haven't been poisoned or anything so dramatic," he said. 

She pressed her shoulders against the wall. Smooth and cold. Solid metal. The space echoed each footstep over and over into that tall ceiling as the person in front of her moved. She was looking at his knees and that irritated her but her head was too heavy for her to sit up. Dark blue trousers, maybe, the colours were hard to pick out in the dark. Shiny dress shoes. Everything about him was perfectly neat. 

"You've got old man shoes," she said. 

Whatever drug was making her so heavy had met up with the adrenaline rush brought on by her fear and it was making her dizzy. She couldn't remember what had happened the night before. Chat Noir had been in her bedroom. There had been rain or a fountain or something else with water. There was something important she needed to remember about her mother but none of it would come together. 

Instead of making sense of the jumble, she was stuck on the shoes. The shoes were hilarious. She started to giggle. If she could have thought of something, she would have made a Chat Noir pun. Instead she just said, "How long does it take to polish them like that?" 

"Listen to me, you insolent child," he snapped in a voice that if it had come from a teacher or a police officer, would have made her flinch. Sharp. Authoritative. He was probably used to being listened to. One of those men. All sharp orders and shiny shoes. 

She kept giggling. 

A little voice in her head told her this was probably hysterics. This is what happened when you lost it. She tried to reel the laughter back in but it was echoing off the walls. Uneven and wheezy to begin with and more and more ridiculous each time it bounced back to her. She laughed harder. 

He grabbed her by the upper arm and lifted her. He shook her once, making her teeth clatter together. Panic knocked the hysterics aside and she fell still. He leaned her up against the wall and held her there with that one hand on her arm. The hand wrapped around her arm didn't squeeze or press but it was as unmovable as the wall at her back. 

"Where are the earrings?" he asked. 

"What earrings?" she asked. 

She looked at him now. The mask covered more than just his eyes like hers or Chat Noir's. His entire face was hidden away behind the silver. His face was all sharp angles. Sharp cheekbones. Sharp jaw. Sharp expression. Even the lapels on his jacket were sharp and shiny. The light was behind them so his face was all shadows and angles. Only one eye was visible, blue and hard. 

This was Hawkmoth. 

Stupid shoes. Silver lapels like something out of an old music video. She fell back into herself slowly. 

This was Hawkmoth. 

In his stupid costume. 

It was his fault. 

With that thought, she remembered exactly what was his fault. 

"You Akumatized my parents, you-" she started but the words failed her. 

She curled her hands into fists and kicked at him. His expression shifted but he didn't move as her rain boot made contact with his shin. His suit was like theirs. Throwing him through a wall wouldn't have slowed him down, her little tantrum wasn't going to change that. Hawkmoth glared at her and she kicked him again. She tried to yank her arm free and when that didn't work she slapped him with her free hand. That earned her a flash of anger before the calm swallowed it again. 

"My needs are simple. I require the miracle stones. Once I have them, everything else can go back to the way it was. Your parents and the rest of them and all the petty disagreements that plague Paris. I will leave it all be, just give me the stones," he said. 

"I don't know what you're talking about, you monster," she said. 

She was still struggling and he was still not moving. She fell still and pulled herself as far back as she could. He wasn't going to let go of her arm but that didn't mean she had to touch him anywhere else. She kept her hands tightly balled into fists and wondered where her cellphone was. Her head was clearing. Whether it was anger or time that were wearing off the effects of the drug didn't matter. Her thoughts were tangled but she was starting to smooth them out into plans and ideas. 

"I see what my Akuma see and Chat Noir had an interesting new partner in that last fight. A little girl. Black hair, blue eyes, about the right height. You looked an awful lot like the answer to a puzzle," Hawkmoth's voice was even, like he was delivering a lecture or a presentation at a business meeting. His calm made her want to throw another tantrum or laugh in his face again. 

"How dare you?" she said. 

Marinette was surprised that these words came out as cool as his. Her wheezy hysterical voice was gone and her anger was changing as she left the tantrum behind. "How dare you pretend this is a puzzle or a game? What is wrong with you? People could die. What if someone died? What if that Pharaoh guy had sacrificed my best friend? Would you have stopped him? Would you have cared? People could have died. People are out there right now, frozen and trapped and you're sitting here in the dark trying to take jewelry from an insolent child." 

She spit out the last words. 

"Anger is useful," he said. 

He reached out his free hand. Holding it palm out as though welcoming someone to a stage. His posture was perfect. Something about the dramatic flair annoyed her. She was already angry but this little bit of posing made her kick him again. It was useless but it made him snap his head back to her and glare and she took some satisfaction in that. 

At least she was annoying him. 

She hadn't seen them in the dark but something moved beyond him and a cascade of white butterflies rose out of the dark. They swirled in the half-light. Anywhere else, it might have been beautiful. A tiny whirlwind of fluttering wings, not quite iridescent but still flashing back any ray of sun they caught. One of them broke away and landed on Hawkmoth's outstretched hand. 

"What are you going to do now?" she asked. 

"Make you a little more manageable," he said. 

Her stomach dropped and took all her confidence with it. The anger was still there but it was replaced by nausea. She shifted away from the hand with the butterfly but there was nowhere for her to go. 

When she was very small she had had a few months of terrible nightmares. They weren't the kind of nightmares that she could remember when she woke up but she always woke up screaming. Her mother had sat with her each night and whispered into her ear that she was safe and to remember to breath all the way in and all the way out until she stopped crying. She wasn't safe not but she found that pattern of breathing. All the way in and all the way out. 

Hawkmoth let go of her. 

She wasn't expecting it and she just stood there and watched him while he curled both hands around the butterfly. In the dark, the purple glow was alien but immediately recognizable. She had never seen an Akuma before but she had seen them after. She pushed past him to put as much distance between the little ball of purple energy and herself as she could. 

She looked around the room once she was moving. On the best of days, she was clumsy, still shaking off whatever drug she'd been given and reeling through her fear, she was surprised she could walk at all. With space between her and Hawkmoth, she spun in a circle, her hands out stretched to keep her balance. There wasn't a door. The metal girders of the room rose to a dome broken only by a giant window. The light came from a watery shaft of sunlight peaking through a little open space in the shutter. 

"It could find you anywhere you chose to go," Hawkmoth said conversationally. 

Her revulsion climbed back up her throat and she made herself a promise that if she did throw up, she was doing it on his stupid shiny shoes. She turned back around to face him. He was standing on a hatch door. It was an attic, just like her bedroom. Another wave of hysteria rose as she imagined the room done up in the pinks she had chosen for her room. She could put up her post of Adrien across from the window where it would get good light. She choked down the urge to laugh again and raised her chin instead. Two could play at perfect posture. 

"I've never tried this before," he said. 

"You do this all the time," she said. 

"Ah, but from a distance, I can pick out that petty little voice in people's heads that whines 'it isn't fair' and fills them with anger and resentment but you are trying to quiet that voice. I can feel that too. It's a different sort of challenge," he said. 

"Maybe you shouldn't poke around in other people's heads," she said. 

"People's heads are rarely worth the trouble. Petty problems. They don't know true loss," he said. 

"And you do? That's what this is about? You lost something and now you feel like its your right to destroy the rest of Paris? You make everything worse. You're just a petty old man in a dusty old attic," she asked. 

He expression shifted again. Eyebrows drawn together, lips tightening. If she wasn't staring at him, she might not have noticed but the anger made her pause and bite back anything else. She took a deep breath and called back up that memory of her mother holding her after a nightmare. She held onto that memory of being safe and tried to remember to breath all the way in. 

"The escapade at the school might have just been a brave girl who got lucky but no, Chat Noir followed you home. It's hard to follow a superhero home. It's not so hard to have a private investigator find out where a teenage girl lives," he said. 

He stood back and spoke in that even voice. The little purple butterfly was still there in his hands. It was a butterfly. It shouldn't have been such a threat. Her shoulders kept getting tighter and she was fighting the urge to just run even though the only option would be to run around the room in circles while he mocked her so she stayed still. His words came through her panic a moment after he said them. He  had hired somebody to watch her. They had spied on her family. Her anger curled a little tighter in every muscle. 

"So you spied on me, decided that I'm a superhero, had my family turned into electric zombies and then kidnapped me?" she said. 

"We can avoid this part if makes you so uncomfortable. Just tell me where you put the earrings and it all goes back to normal," he said. 

"I don't know where your earrings are but you know where my house is. I'm sure you can hire someone to break in and find my jewelry box. I think I have some little purple flower ones that would go well with your outfit," she said. 

He looked at her like she was something he had stepped in on a sidewalk. Disgusting and distracting and below him. She hadn't relaxed her tight fists because if she did, she knew her hands were going to shake and that wasn't something she wanted him to see. 

She stayed where she was as he opened his hands. Just a butterfly. It flitted up out of his hold, turning in the air before coming towards her. She stumbled backwards and ran into another wall. Her fingers twitched for her yo-yo as her mind worked out the trajectory from where she stood to the little bit of light in coming through the window. 

She tried to duck out of the way of butterfly and lost her balance. She felt the change as she slid down the wall. 

Her anger flashed and then pushed in on her. It pressed out every other thought. For a moment, she was all rage and nothing else. Hatred and bitterness and it was all blinding. She was overcome by how unfair it all was. She didn't deserve this. Someone needed to pay for this. 

"You will be-" Hawkmoth's voice was inside her head. 

Revulsion pushed through everything else. His people had been inside her house. His Akuma were inside her parents. He didn't get to be inside her head too. 

The anger was still pushing down. 

_Someone needed to pay for this._

The little message inside her head, over and over to blame someone, to take revenge because someone needed to pay for this. 

_Someone needed to pay for this._

"Stop," she wheezed. 

She did throw up. She was on her knees and she hadn't eaten anything since the hot chocolate with Chat Noir the night before but she retched up the remains of it as she surfaced through the rage. It was like pushing up through deep water. All that anger. 

_Someone needed to pay for this._

She pushed the thought to the side. That was the Akuma. That was him. That wasn't what she wanted. All she wanted was for him to turn her parents back. She didn't need revenge. 

"Interesting," Hawkmoth said. 

"What will you do when you have it?" her voice was raspy. 

"The miracle stone?" he asked. 

"No. After that. Revenge. That's what you want, I can feel it," she muttered. 

"This is your anger, not mine. They took something from you, your parents, let me back in and I'll help you get it back. You will take what is rightfully yours," he said and the Akuma heard him. Though she knew that was what was happening, she still felt it.

_Trust him. It's true. He's just trying to help. Someone needed to pay for this. Trust him._

She didn't him at all. It was his fault. No one else needed to pay for anything. 

"What did you lose?" she asked.  

"Don't play at understanding things you know nothing about," he said. 

"Don't make other people clean up your messes," she said. 

He didn't answer her in words. The anger rushed back into her and she was drowning in it again but she grabbed hold of that one reminder and held on. This feeling was his. This feeling wasn't hers. 

She curled herself up as though she could physically hold onto a thought. Her knees drawn up to her chest. Her arms wrapped around her stomach. She tucked her head in and took a deep breath of her raincoat. It still smelled like rain and faintly of chocolate. Maybe that was all in her head but it helped to hold onto the reminder that the anger wasn't hers. 

His revenge. Not her revenge. Her own anger was different. A fire to this flood. Hot and sharp not deep and suffocating. She wasn't going to help him take his revenge. He didn't deserve the help. 

"Stubborn brat," he said. 

She wanted to say something clever but she couldn't find the energy to fight down his rage and make smart ass comments at the same time. Chat Noir would probably have some ridiculous pun if he were here. 

"I have other things to attend to. I will speak with you when you're over this little bit of rebellion," he said. 

She heard his footsteps echoing as he walked past her and then the grind of the window as the shutter slid open with a mechanical thunk. She wanted to force her eyes open and see how he did it but she was still working on controlling the rushing press of emotion in her head. If not now, then later, she would figure out how to open the window and how to climb down. She had managed climbing along the ledges at school. She could do it again. 

Hawkmoth was busy with something else. Chat Noir was still out there. She hoped he was alright and that Alya had gotten the message to him. If he didn't understand it, she wasn't sure what was going to happen. Her thoughts were clearing just enough for thoughts like that. The strength of the anger receded when Hawkmoth's attention wasn't on her but she could still feel the Akuma whispering in her ear. 

_Someone needed to pay for this._

She pushed the thought out over and over. She didn't hear the trap door open but she did hear it clang shut as Hawkmoth left her in the dark. She curled up a little tighter and put all her thoughts into planning. Once she was alone, she let herself admit it. 

Maybe the Akuma was a little bit right. 

_Someone needed to pay for this._

Hawkmoth needed to pay for this. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shout out to theworlds-stage for letting me rant about Marinette's level of gallows humour. We decided as we had no evidence to disprove that Marinette would snark in the face of danger that she would snark in the face of danger in this story. 
> 
> Also this story is going to rocket through to the end from this point. I'm estimating just shy of 30k based on where we are. 
> 
> I am into exams now for those keeping tabs on my life. My next semester starts in a week and instead of having 8 courses, I have 5 courses and three days of full time placement. (augh when they said 'intensive stream' they weren't kidding) So we're probably not going back to rapid fire updates because it's out of the frying pan into the slightly different frying pan. 
> 
> But I've set myself the rule that I must finish this one before I can start writing the "Chat Noir can't change back" story and I know what happens between here and the end so I'm optimistic.


	11. Bloody Earrings and Bad News

Adrien sat in his room with his feet tucked up beneath him on his bed. Plagg buzzed around his head, taking his time with a piece of Camembert and stinking up the room. Adrien unwrapped Marinette's little purse, the same one he had hidden Tikki away in when he'd returned her and unzipped it. A little red head popped out. He jerked back in surprise, reeling and dropping the bag on the floor at his feet. 

Tikki's eyes were little slits and she peered blearily around the room before yawning and then climbing back down inside and disappearing from view. 

"Hey, wait!" Adrien said. 

The bag rustled but the Kwami didn't say anything. He lunged for the bag and held it close to his face and stared in at her. 

"Where is Marinette? Do you know?" he asked.

No answer. 

"She was supposed to go to Alya's but she never got there. Were you awake for that? Where is she?" he asked.

His voice was rising. He was still exhausted and each moment made him more worried. He needed answers and Tikki sleeping through his questions when he couldn't even afford to close his eyes was infuriating. He glared down at the notebook and the wallet and the little red ball of semi conscious Kwami but that didn't help. He started to say something when there was a knock on his bedroom door. He shoved Tikki and the entire purse behind the pillows on the couch in time to see his father step into the room. 

"After all the fuss you put up to attend that ridiculous public academy, I would have expected you to be in classes," his father said. 

"There are frozen Akuma people out on the streets within blocks of the school, the teacher didn't think it was safe for us to be there. I have my homework," he shook his backpack.

That the teacher had not sent him home and that his backpack still held homework from the day before and he hadn't even bothered to bring it to class were things he left out. His father paid meticulous attention to some details and didn't even notice others. His tie was perfect and matched in tone and shade to every other piece of his outfit but he may have skipped both breakfast and lunch because he was busy. Adrien hoped that this wasn’t a detail he was planning on pursuing. 

"You have noticed the frozen Akuma people, haven't you?" Adrien asked then immediately bit down on his tongue to stop other words from escaping. That was rude. He wasn't rude to his father, he was never rude to his father, his father didn't tolerate it. He needed to sleep before he said something he couldn't take back. 

"I have," his father said, "And I would recommend that since you are home, that you spend the rest of the afternoon inside. You're piano has been slipping and the reports from your Mandarin teacher will be coming in this month and I expect that you haven't fallen behind in that as well." 

"Of course not, Father," Adrien said. 

This was a lie but he wanted his room to himself so he could worry about real problems. His Mandarin book sat on his desk and he was weeks behind in the written work though he'd done most of his reading. He needed to practice his arpeggios and there was a theory exercise sitting on top of the Mandarin text in a neat pile. All the edges of all the pages lined up so it looked perfect and no one would ask why he was piling up his work instead of submitting it. His father was going to be disappointed by every report. 

And if Mme Mendeleiv was re-Akumatized then half of Paris was going to be electrified without Ladybug to fix it. 

Some things were more important than falling behind in his music class. 

He did not say that aloud. 

"I don't care what your friends are up to, stay inside. I expect to hear improvement when you are practicing tomorrow," his father said. 

And that meant that his father would be out that evening. He didn't expect to hear Adrien playing tonight which meant he wouldn't be here. Nathalie would be gone by dinner hour and that meant that the only people in the house were going to be him and the night watchman. That made the plan to go find Marinette easier. His father was still talking but Adrien was already turning over that thought in his head. He didn't know where it start but that was what mattered most. 

"Yes, father," he said when the list of instructions for what he was to do reached its conclusion. He could tell by the note of finality in his father's voice even when his mind was turning too fast to concentrate on the words.  As Gabriel turned to leave, Adrien launched himself up off the couch and followed him to the door, "Father?" 

"Yes?" Gabriel turned and looked down at him. 

"Be careful. I saw some of the people on the way to school, there were police around them but if you're going out, be careful," Adrien said. 

His father stared at him for a little bit too long and Adrien started to wonder if he had made a terrible mistake in bringing it up at all. Gabriel tilted his head to the side and then nodded, "I will." 

When his father was gone he rummaged behind the cushions and pulled Tikki back out. She looked like she was asleep again but now that he knew she was capable of waking, it took everything he had not to shake her. He left the open bag on his bedspread. It looked so out of place, all pink and floral. He wasn't sure he owned anything pink. Marinette was a pink and flowers kind of person but he couldn't imagine the same of Ladybug herself. 

His frustration got the better of him and he did shake the little bag gently but Tikki didn’t wake. He put it back down on the bed and frowned up at Plagg. Plagg just shrugged in that way he had. It could have meant anything. Then Plagg fell still and frowned over Adrien’s head at the big windows. He spun around to look as well but whatever it was was gone. All he could see was rooftops and blue skies. 

“What?” Adrien asked. 

“I thought I saw lightning. Maybe it was nothing,” Plagg said. 

“Not funny,” Adrien said. 

He crossed the room to lean out the window but he couldn’t see anything. It was too sunny for it to be true lightning and the fluffy white clouds drifted along without a care in the world. Maybe Plagg was as tired as he was but just in case, he threw himself down on the couch and flicked on the news. 

He watched the screen for 30 seconds before bounding back up. 

He stared at the images without moving and then swore. The footage coming in was still blurry and distant but it was obviously purple lightning and chaos. A few of the feeds cut out as electric shocks blew out the cameras. 

“What do we do?” he asked Plagg. 

“Without Ladybug, the best you and I could do is go out there and get ourselves electrocuted again and I didn’t enjoy that the first time we did it,” Plagg said. 

“You’re about as helpful as all that cheese you eat. Marinette is missing, Tikki is still half dead and Paris is being zapped by a physics teacher with a grudge,” Adrien said. 

Plagg floated over the back of the couch and looked between him and the television set. His little tail twitched but he was otherwise impassive. Adrien stared back at him for a little while as though it would give him a better answer. Plagg just flicked his tail and looked out at the city with just the ghost of concern on his face or maybe it was nothing. It was impossible to tell with Plagg. 

Another idea hit him. 

Adrien picked up Marinette’s bag again and lifted Tikki out and put her down on the sofa. She didn’t so much as blink but he kept rummaging in the bag, pushing things out the way. She had sat up and wasn’t curled into a ball any more and that meant…

“A-ha!” Adrien said. 

He pulled the pair of earrings out and held them in his hand. He cut his eyes to the screen and then back to the earrings. They were small and plain and red against his palm. Just two little circles, they didn’t look all that powerful. He closed his hand to check his ring and it didn’t look like anything special either. 

“All I have to do is find Mme Mendeleiev and purify that Akuma and the others will go with it, right?” he said more to himself than Plagg. 

“It’s not your Miraculous,” Plagg said drifting closer. 

“Does that mean it won’t work?” he asked. 

“No, it’ll work. Probably,” Plagg said. 

“You’re confidence is doing wonders for my nerves,” Adrien said. 

Plagg just drifted over to land on the back of the sofa and watch him. Adrien shook his head and went to rummage in his drawers with no luck. He had seen this in a movie once and wasn’t exactly looking forward to it but it hadn’t seemed that difficult. He ran for the stairs and made his way down to the kitchen to grab a handful of ice cubes and stopped by his father’s office to steal a sewing needle.

“You’re going to look so pretty with earrings,” Plagg said. 

“Shut up or I will never buy another piece of Camembert as long as I live,” Adrien snapped as he held an ice cube against his ear. He swore as he pushed the needle through and slipped the earring in. There was blood on his fingers but he did the other ear as wel and swore again. 

“Very pretty, I like how you made a bloody mess of it, it sets off the colour so well,” Plagg said in a disturbingly accurate imitation of Gabriel when he was over seeing new designs. Adrien glared at him and rubbed at his neck to try and get any blood off. 

“That’s it, never visiting another fromagerie, ever,” Adrien said. 

He looked down at Tikki who had struggled up to a sitting position and was watching him with wide eyes. 

“We can do this, right?” he asked Tikki. 

“You won’t have much time, I’m not very strong,” she said in a soft voice. 

“Fast, I can do fast, sure, no problem,” Adrien said. 

He scooped Tikki up and tucked her in his pocket, no use wasting his transformation on the run back to school. He hesitated before leaving the ring and Plagg behind. He didn’t want to but Plagg thought that carrying both miracle stones would make the transformation unstable, he had to be one or the other. 

He bounced on his heels for a moment, staring at the tv screen full of increasingly clear images of people with purple hair and electricity jumping between their fingers and trying not to panic at the prospect of doing this alone. 

Then he was running. If he was all the city had, then he would do everything he could. 


End file.
